Sun 5 Feb 2017 In: New Zealand Daily News View at Wayback View at NDHA
National party MPs attending next weekend's Big Gay Out in Auckland will be the focus of a protest action for "inflicting much pain on the working class of NZ which includes the LGBTI community." The orgainsers, Socialist LGBT Aotearoa, were last December to the fore of a South Auckland protest action objecting to Destiny Church leader Brian Tamaki's linking disastrous earthquakes with homosexuality. "We're suffering a housing crisis, low wages, poverty, income inequality, homelessness, migrant exploitation and environmental destruction," the group says. They say the Big Gay Out protest is intended to be peaceful but they plan to make their voices heard if representatives of National "try to speak on the main stage." Anticipating possible disapproval from some LGBTI people, "to those people who say we are making the BGO political, the politicians are making it political by coming to the event to suck up to us for our votes and our apparent "pink dollar." It has become traditional for the main parties to present glbti or LGBTI-friendly MPs on the BGO main stage.The NZ AIDS Foundation, which oversees the running of the BGO, says invitations have been sent to all political parties to attend. In recent years party leaders including Prime Ministers Helen Clark and John Key have taken to the stage to sometimes mixed receptions. It is not yet known if Prime Minister Bill English will take up the invitation.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Sunday, 5th February 2017 - 8:59pm